COLD OPEN – DORM 3B – LATE AFTERNOON
Riley and Maya are “studying” (which looks suspiciously like rearranging stickers on a planner). Phone dings. A text from LUCAS: “Touchdown. Boomerang back. Details at Eric's? 🤠🦬”
Maya: (feral squeal) He’s back.
Riley: (same energy, then panics) Our essay is due at 9 a.m.
Maya: Essays are forever. Cowboys are… also forever. But cuter.
Riley: Ring power, then paragraph power.
Maya & Riley: Ring power.
Smash to sting.
ACT ONE
SCENE A – ERIC'S APARTMENT – EARLY EVENING (A-PLOT KICKS)
A comfy Philly walk-up: thrifted couch, cowboy hat on a lamp, Dean Buffalo on a shelf. Farkle’s agenda on the coffee table; Zay has fries he “found.”
Eric (bursting from the tiny kitchen, sash on): Good! (door) Better!
Lucas enters with a duffel and that apologetic grin.
Maya: You came back.
Lucas: Not all the way back—twenty minutes that way back. Westchester Ag & Vet Institute partnered with Pennbrook for lab hours. I do goats in the morning, anatomy here in the afternoon. And I’m crashing here until I find housing.
Zay: A true commuter cowboy.
Farkle: (already adding to his calendar) And your visitation windows?
Lucas: Weeknights after six unless a cow gives birth. Saturdays are “us,” Sundays are study.
Maya: (melts) He made a plan. My love language is infrastructure.
Riley: (trying to be normal) I’m very calm for you. (immediately not calm) I’m not calm at all!
They group hug. Eric tries to join; everyone groans; he joins anyway.
Eric: The boomerang returns. Good!
SCENE B – KITCHEN PASS-THROUGH – CONTINUOUS
Zay leans to Eric, conspiratorial.
Zay: Operation “Farkle Can’t Even.”
Eric: Codename?
Zay: Project: Truck-Driver Key Change.
Eric: We modulate his schedule up a half-step every scene until he breaks into interpretive math.
They fist-bump. Farkle senses a disturbance.
Farkle: Why do I feel like someone just reflowed my Gantt chart?
Zay/Eric: No reason.
SCENE C – DORM 3B – LATER
Riley pins a sticky note: “Comp Lit: 1500 words by 9 a.m.” Maya sets out snacks like a raccoon wedding.
Riley: Tonight: we write. Lucas news is a side dish.
Maya: Lucas news is the entrée, dessert, and tiny mint on the way out.
Riley: I will physically duct-tape us to our desks.
Lucas pokes in the doorway with a sheepish wave.
Riley/Maya: (in unison) Hi.
Lucas: I’m just saying goodnight. And leaving. Because boundaries. (beat) Also I brought you both pens shaped like tiny cows.
Maya: He’s dangerous.
They peck him; he exits; they spin to the laptops.
Riley: Essay.
Maya: Essay.
They both type: “The—”
They both stop, grin at nothing.
Riley/Maya: Ugh!
ACT TWO
SCENE D – QUAD / STUDENT CENTER – NEXT MORNING
Riley and Maya, faintly feral from minimal sleep, cross paths with Zay, Eric, and a very caffeinated Farkle.
Farkle: 08:00—Window Collective set-up. 08:15—lab safety check. 08:30—Dean’s—
Eric: Surprise! The Dean meeting moved to 08:23 because we love jazz.
Farkle: Schedules do not start at :23.
Zay: Life starts at :23. Also we RSVP’d you to Power Ballad Breakfast Club at 08:47.
Farkle: That’s… not a time.
Eric: It is if you believe.
Farkle twitches.
Riley: (to Maya) If I stare at the sun, will it give me a thesis?
Maya: Worth a shot.
Lucas jogs up in scrubs with a jacket.
Lucas: Morning. First rotation: goats. Second rotation: you two eating breakfast like humans.
Riley: (melts) He’s a calendar with biceps.
Maya: Go save the goats. We’ll save the grade.
He kisses her forehead and peels off. They exchange a look: focus.
SCENE E – RACHEL’S OFFICE – 08:23 EXACTLY
Farkle, Zay, and Eric sit. Rachel looks over her glasses.
Rachel: Why is Mr. Minkus vibrating?
Zay: He’s experimenting with syncopation.
Eric: It’s character development.
Farkle: They are committing a hate crime against time.
Rachel: Hm. As Dean, I endorse structure. As Rachel, I endorse a little mess. (to Zay/Eric) You get one hour a week to “Candid Camera” Farkle. (to Farkle) You schedule it.
Farkle: I… schedule my own chaos?
Rachel: Or I schedule a course called “Uncertainty in Human Systems” and enroll you all.
Eric: (salutes) Good! We accept Mondays at 4:13.
Farkle: (pained) …Fine. 4:13.
Rachel: We’ve invented Containment Banter. Congratulations.
Farkle… relaxes 5%. Progress.
SCENE F – LIBRARY – AFTERNOON
Riley and Maya, surrounded by coffee, finally find flow.
Riley: (reading her screen) “Alone together is the modern pilgrimage—” That’s… something?
Maya: “We romanticize the distraction to avoid the revelation.” That’s… also something.
Riley: We might be geniuses. Or hallucinating.
Maya: Yes.
Skyler (RA): (whispering) Last call for printers. And hydration. And touching grass.
Riley: We’ll touch grass at graduation.
They type furiously.
SCENE G – PRACTICE YARD – LATE AFTERNOON
Lucas exits lab, finds Maya on a bench printing pages from her phone.
Lucas: How’d it go?
Maya: We did it. There were metaphors. And also this sentence I don’t understand but my soul seems into it.
Lucas: I knew you would. (beat) Thank you for not making me choose between here and there.
Maya: I like you boomerang. I don’t need you Velcro.
Lucas: (smiles) I’ll embroider that on a pillow.
They sit. Quiet good.
ACT THREE
SCENE H – ERIC'S PLACE – EARLY EVENING (B-PLOT PAYOFF)
A little sign: “Containment Banter – Mondays, 4:13–5:00.” Zay and Eric are READY with props. Farkle arrives… with a whistle and a stopwatch.
Farkle: Ground rules. You get 47 minutes to attempt to shatter my composure. When the stopwatch dings, order resumes.
Eric: You set the chaos calendar to :13. Cute.
Zay: Hit it, Maestro.
Montage:
-
Zay plays a clip of a key change; Eric yanks a rug slightly askew; Farkle straightens it without looking.
-
Zay moves items on Farkle’s desk by spiral numbers; Farkle breathes through it, labels the spiral.
-
Eric keeps swapping Farkle’s pen for a crayon; Farkle finishes a perfect chart in crayon.
Stopwatch dings.
Farkle: Time.
Zay: He cannot be rattled.
Eric: We created a monster. A punctual, purple-pen monster.
Farkle: I prefer “optimized human.” Same time next week.
They high-five in reluctant respect.
SCENE I – WINDOW COLLECTIVE MEETING – NIGHT
A small crowd. Donation bins. Rachel at the back, Skyler at the sign-in, Zay setting up a speaker, Farkle taping a neat agenda, Eric placing Dean Buffalo on the table like a mascot.
Riley and Maya arrive, bleary but proud, clutching their submitted-receipt emails.
Riley: We turned it in.
Maya: We turned us in. Boundaries with a thesis.
Lucas: (arriving with a little bouquet of supermarket daisies) For the authors.
Riley: (soft) For the window.
They sit. Riley addresses the group.
Riley: Quick share: we almost let good news steal our good work. Today we learned—celebrate, then show up. We did both. You can, too.
Maya: And if you’re far from someone you love—be near to the thing you’re building. It makes the reunion sweeter.
They exchange a look. Ring power.
Riley/Maya: Ring power.
Rachel watches, proud.
Rachel (to Skyler, quiet): Glue.
Skyler: The good kind.
TAG – CAMPUS GREEN – LATE NIGHT
Riley, Maya, Lucas, Farkle, Zay, and Eric lay on blankets looking up. The girls drift toward sleep; Zay hums a legally-paraphrased power ballad; Farkle sets an alarm for exactly 4:13 next Monday; Eric wears his sash as a blanket.
Maya: (half-asleep) You’re still here, right?
Lucas: (squeezes her hand) I’m right here. And twenty minutes that way. But right here.
Riley: Alone together.
Maya: Together alone.
Zay: And with Céline in our hearts.
Farkle: …Fine.
They laugh quietly under the campus sky as the boomerang cowboy stares up at the stars he left and found again.
END.
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